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‘I support my own, dickhead or not’ – McCullagh wants to get Irish revenge for DOJ and rival Doheny

Tyrone McCullagh [14(6)-1(0)] believes he is the one Irishman Ionut Baluta [14(3)-2(0)] can not defeat.

‘White Chocolate’ sees plenty of reasons to make a fight with the Romanian, whose last two wins came against Portlaoise’s former world champ TJ Doheny and Mullingar native David Oliver Joyce.

First and foremost, the Derry favourite believes it’s a winnable fight, plus Baluta has the WBO super bantamweight European ranking title McCullagh vacated to enter the Golden Contract – not mention the chance to get revenge for the Irish scalps taken.

“100 percent, I’d love that fight. He has my old belt that I vacated and I want it back,” McCullagh told Irish-Boxing.com.

“He’s very impressive, and seems to be getting better each fight, but I believe I beat him. I’m a completely different kettle of fish style-wise than Davey and TJ,” he adds with confidence.

Speaking with regard to Irish revenge, the awkwardest of southpaws revealed that this would be an element he would relish, even though himself and Doheny, who Baluta beat in Dubai, are not on good terms.

“Would you like Irish revenge ? For Davey yes,” he adds laughing.

“No, only joking. I do, even for TJ. I’m an Irishman at the end of the day so I support my own, dickhead or not.”

Considering he has been in with two MTK fighters back to back, a fight mentioned by Pete Taylor doesn’t look too hard to make.

However, Baluta told Irish-boxing.com he hopes to move down to bantam and McCullagh claims there is nothing in the pipeline.

“Nothing at the minute,” he responds when asks about next step plans.

“I’m training away though and have been speaking to my management. I know they’re on the ball, so just waiting on a call, soon hopefully,” he adds.

The 30-year-old has previously been very open about his struggles post his first career defeat to Ryan Walsh. Speaking to Irish-boxing.com he revealed lockdown was also a struggle and admits he came close to calling it a day.

“It’s been too long away from the ring. Lockdown was very, very tough, my motivation was at an all time low and I’ve had fleeting notions of packing it in.They’re gone for now and I’ve got the hunger back again but if another one comes I won’t know what to do, because I need to put food in the table at the end of the day and haven’t fought since February.”

Jonny Stapleton

Irish-boxing.com contributor for 15 years and editor for the past decade. Have been covering boxing for over 16 years and writing about sports for a living for over 20 years. Former Assistant Sports editor for the Gazette News Paper Group and former Tallaght Voice Sports Editor. Have had work published in publications around the world when working as a freelance journalist. Also co-founder of Junior Sports Media and Leinster Rugby PRO of the Year winner. email: editoririshboxing@gmail.com

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